Republican attacks against the Obama administration’s handling of the attempted airline bombing on Christmas Day are working, according to a new poll out Monday, even though the president’s overall ratings on national security remain high.

Fifty-seven percent of likely voters approve of Obama’s handling of national security — 10 points higher than his general 47 percent approval rating, according to a new Democracy Corps/GQR/Third Way poll out Monday.

Where Obama loses: interrogation and prosecution of terrorism suspects, where a 51-44 percent majority disapproves. Republicans have hammered the administration for its decision to read the alleged Christmas Day bomber his Miranda rights, and the poll results show the message is sticking.

“Two months of Republican criticism have taken a toll,” the pollsters say, with a plurality of likely voters saying they feel less confident about Obama’s handling of national security because of the way he handled the Christmas Day attempt. “And when phrased as a partisan attack, a 60 percent majority of likely voters feels more confident about the Republicans on national security,” they said.

The memo, prepared by veteran Democratic pollsters Stan Greenberg and Jeremy Rosner, advises Democrats to avoid what has so far been one of their key counter-arguments: Comparing the underwear bomber to so-called shoe bomber Richard Reid, who was read his Miranda rights after the Bush administration arrested him. “Voters resist the argument that the Obama administration simply handled the Christmas bomber in the same way the Bush administration handled the ‘shoe bomber’ case; this sounds political, and produces a weak response,” they wrote.

“Their capacity to attack Democrats as weak really is boundless,” said Matt Bennett, a co-founder of Third Way, citing attacks on Democratic war veterans John Kerry and Max Cleland. “So we just expect that they will do it again to all Democrats whether they are war veterans or neophytes,” he said.

On national security, the poll found that 50 percent of likely voters prefer Republicans, while only 33 percent prefer Democrats. It’s the return of a “security gap” that all but vanished in 2008 because of Obama’s popularity and Bush’s mishandling of Iraq, Bennett said